Correction

A correctional facility is a training school, treatment, and/or residential institution/program for juvenile offenders committed by the court to the care and custody of an agency for a determinate period. The PbS program for correction facilities provides more than 100 outcome measures. The outcome measures show how a facility’s services and performance meet the PbS standards in safety, order, security, programming (education), health/mental health services, justice, reintegration and connection to family and social supports. The outcome measures are available as easy-to-read bar graph reports available twice a year showing change and improvement every six months as well as performance compared to similar facilities.

The outcomes are derived from information collected from surveys:

One administrative form to collect general information about the facility, population, procedures and staff;

All incident reports filed during each of the data collection months to provide the facility with the ability to analyze the frequency and kinds of incidents that are occurring;

A minimum random sample of 30 youth records to capture information about youths’ experiences and services received during their time at the facility;

A minimum random sample of 30 surveys of youths and staff to gather feedback about facility conditions, quality of life, staff-youth relationships and services;

Surveys of all families of all youths leaving the facility to learn about the families’ experiences with the facility, relationships with staff and ability to stay connected to their child; and

Exit interviews of all youths released to provide a youth’s perspective on his or her experience while at the facility, programming, staff and preparedness for leaving.

All PbS facilities are provided with a PbS coach, a juvenile justice expert who provides support throughout the year by telephone and email and who visits once a year to guide implementation of PbS. The coach works with facilities to use the data reports to develop Facility Improvement Plans (FIPs), which are entered into the PbS website and shared widely to engage agency leaders and staff in its implementation. Agency leaders, facility staff and the PbS coach monitors the FIP using on-line comments that create a living document for reform and records change strategy.